DRUMMER CAFE - Community Forum

Ive just been playing drums for  few years. Everytime I play with the band, I always feel disatisfied and sometimes even get discourage to play after I left the practice room. I lack good fills and variations which I usually end up using thesame fills all the time.

Id like to hear  good exercises  and advices from you gentlemen.

Thank you.


Herns
Singapore

nanboylim:
Remember this: Attitude is 90% of anything you do.

When you feel frustrated ... step outside .... take a few deep breathes, ... and then start again.

When doing fills, remember that less can be more. I remember when I started and thought that 16th note fills were the bomb.

Then I started realizing that I was playing the same 16ths around the toms all the time.

Play less sometimes. One smack on a tom and cymbal can be more effective than fast fills!

Hope this helps.
DJ

Try listening to some different music, too, so you have some fresh influences. On boards like this you may see some of us mention some drummers you're not familiar with. Go out and get a few CDs based on recommendations from some of the regulars here.

I've had many students who only listened to a few bands - I really opened their eyes by turning them onto some different drummers. There are a LOT of great ones out there, and so much to learn!

Don't worry too much about what to play. Work on your timing and stick control, and then let your hands express what is in your heart! Try to not think about what to play, try to feel what to play!
Did you ever notice that some of the best drummers don't play anything flashy or fast, they play what seems to be the right riff at the right place in the right song.
Sometimes I feel like I do not determine what to play at a given spot in the music, the music determines what I play -- like it belonged there!

Like Mister_Acrolite said, listen to lots of different music and remember that music is ART. You must bring your emotions into play or you will continue to be unsatisfied with your performances. Put your heart into it, not your mind!

To djarret, Mister_Acrolite &  DaddyO, I love to hear that! Thank you for your  fast replies gentlemen.

Nan,

It's more important to have 4 fills that you can play really well than to have 50 fills that sound like crap.  I think Gary Chester said that in the November issue of MD.  Or, was it Mickey Roker.  Anyway they're both legendary drummers whose comments on this subject deserve respect.

Having said that, I STRONGLY urge you to get Gary Chaffee's 2 videos on sticking, motion, rhythm, etc.  Gary Chaffee is also a legendary player/teacher who has tought players like Vinnie Colaiutta, Dave Weckle, Steve Smith.  These videos (based on the 4 "Patterns" books he wrote) will give you enough raw material to allow you to create new fills and groves to last the rest of your life.

Ratamatatt

Well I strongly urge everyone to check out this vintage magazine exerpt from a 1987 "Percussioner Intl." magazine I dug up today featuring;

Dig it huckleberry:

http://www.woolyinc.com/chaffee1.jpg
http://www.woolyinc.com/chaffee2.jpg
http://www.woolyinc.com/chaffee3.jpg

i listen to a lot of folk music from the middle east and asia.  if i need some variety in my playing, ill try and adapt some of that to kit.  

Ratamatatt,

Hey, thank you for sharing your ideas as well. Felix had also dig and scan his old archives and generously shared what he has.

Felix, I will be  trying this in my daily exrcises. Thank you for sharing. How I wish I was on this board here few years ago. Lots of ideas to get and things to learn from.

Mark563, good to hear from you too. Blessings. ;D

Listen to guys like Jeff Pocaro and Andy Newmark who to me are masters of their use of toms. Particularly Andy. Here's a guy who uses two toms and you'd swear listening to some of his stuff that he's got at least four toms on his kit. I don't know how he does it.

Agreed! Andy played on John Lennon's last album, Double Fantasy, and there's one song - either Woman or Watchin' the Wheels..; I can't remember which - where he does this slow fill that lasts for two bars. The overall vibe you get is that it's one of those descending fills, working your way down the kit. But he's only got two toms - how come he never runs out of drums? It's amazing.

And of course his tom fills on Carly Simon's Anticipation are bonafide classics!

I got into Andy as a Pink Floyd fan. His playing on "Two Suns In The Sunset" on The Final Cut just knocked me out. The groove is so sweet, the dynamics... not to mention the weird arrangement of the song. I'm sure Nick Mason was scratching his head not getting it and Roger Waters had to bring in Andy! :) After that, he played on Roger's "Pro's And Cons of Hitchhiking" which (if you can get through the album without slashing your wrists ;) ) I highly recommend for brilliant tom playing.

That "Two Suns" performance really turned me around as a player. I started moving away from Bozzio and Bruford as principal influences and started appreciating the fine art of creative and supportive drumming. He became one of my favorite players. Soon after that I went into my Pocaro phase. :) Another thing about Andy... (sorry, I'm on a roll!) he has his cymbals mounted way high above the toms. His thinking was that this way he really had to reach for one, making him only go to a crash if it was really needed in the song. Less frequent "crashing" makes for that much more impact in terms of dynamics when you do crash.

Anyway, sorry to go off topic, but I just love his style. He's definitely a drummer to check out for creative use of toms.

I'm a proponent of putting your crashes up high for similar reasons. Plus, engineers LOVE it, because it gives them so much more separation when they mic you. Anton Fig used to win the "highest cymbals in the world" award on Letterman, but I notice recently that they've come down a few inches.

High cymbals and low toms have one more major advantage - they make you visible to the audience. I got a lot more attention once I started setting up my kit that way. So I guess what I'm saying is "chicks dig it."  :)

Hello Side,

Thanks for sharing.

I got Jeff Porcaros old video by Starlicks and some of Toto's great tunes.  I wonder if he has some reading materials published before.

Not much left to say the other guys haven't said.

A couple of cheap tricks.  Try moving something-a tom cymbal, whatever, or adding something new to your kit.

Also, if you don't already, try cross sticking.  Just cross your arms, and play the same old @$%# you usually do.  Suddenly, it's brand new!  Works real well for me.

Just wanted to add my thoughts on this topic.

In regards to coming up with fill ideas, besides all the other great suggestions, here's a few more to give you some direction.

Get Ted Reed's Syncopation book and use the figures found in this book for your drum fill rhythms. All you need to do is pick a measure from the book, put it around the drums ... and voilà! ... you've got a cool fill. By taking just one of these figures you could spend hours coming up with countless fill ideas. BE CREATIVE!!! There are other books out there, but this is one that everyone should own in their personal library.

Another way I come up with fills is to take the melodic/rhythmic ideas from a song ... and turn it into a fill. It doesn't matter what style or music genre you use ... just apply the phrase around the kit, and you've got a happin' fill. Of course, the more syncopated the melody, the hipper your fill will be. You can even interpret the melodic contour by applying it to the drumkit. No one will know where you got the idea, so you don't have to worry about playing some Chopin piano line during your Heavy Metal gig. It works ... try it!

For an example listen to "Bonzo's Montreux" on the Led Zeppelin album CODA. If your'e into Zep you'll identify the drum fill melody with whole lotta love and others.Bonham is having fun with this over an easy melody  8)

Bart, great Idea.  That Syncopation book may be the most versitile book out there.

Felix, did those Chaffee links come from the Patterns books?

Ratamatatt

Felix,
Do you remember all of the cool fill ideas Pederson had in the Rock Drums class??  That class is chock full of great ideas.  

For you guys that didn't get to go to MI,  read up on www.learn2drum.com, I bet Tim has some cool lessons stashed away in the Past Issues section

Yes I remember some of them.

Filling using groupings are great but your band has to be hip to what they feel like as well.  If you just pull out the heavy artillery it usually throws them the first time around if they aren't expecting it.

It was from an old percussion international mag.-the chaffee grooves I mean.

Side, did you know that Andy and Jeff Porcaro are both uncredited players on the Wall?  I'm a huge Floyd fan, and The Final Cut is my wife's personal favorite.  I read "A Saucerful of Secrets" not too long ago and was amazed to find out the behind the scenes turmoil that Waters had with the rest of the band surrounding "The Wall" and "The Final Cut".  He replaced Nick Mason and Rick Wright on almost everything on FC and about half the drum tracks on The Wall were done by JP and AN.  Bizarre!

Nan-

Once you've equipped yourself with some or all of this great stuff your getting try this.
Identify in a particular song that you want to improve the music leading up to the point you want to place a fill.  If you've got a recording great but just playing it over in your mind will work to.  Imagine to get into the feel of the song, and let your mind come up with a fill or two, etc.  I'm all the time hearing fills that would sound and fit well within songs, I don't always work them out, but that could be another starting point.  Imagine the sound of the fill you wish to achieve then try working it out.  Eventually you'll do this as you play as one mentioned before- you'll be playing and depending on the mood of the song, the band, the audience, all that "FEEL" can lend itself to dictating some great spur of the moment fills.  Maybe fast and furious, maybe stay in the pocket, maybe some real expressive, full but simple fills as in some power ballads POWER UNDER SUBMISSION- you could do more but just like a well trained Arabian stallion you keep yourself in control with the spirit or feel of the song.

There is definately some excelent advice here. The most important thing in my opinion is feel of the song. A powerful up tempo rock tune or ballad might call for a big fill around the toms (i.e. Anything by Rush or something like Journey's Separate Ways). A song that is straight forward and more about keeping time (Steely Dan) might call for a short 2 count fill on the snare alone. As mentioned earlier in this thread, listen to what the song is dictating. You definately should focus on developing your hands and feet though so you won't have to think about how to play what you hear. And again listen to as much diferent music as you can. I hope this helps, and definately don't get discouraged. those fills will work out with time and a lot of practice.

One drummer that we could all learn a riff or two from is Trilok Gurtu. He is from Bombay, India and has very unique and aggressive style when playing so-called Western music. Listen to him on John McLaughlin's "Live at the Royal Festival Hall" or "Que Alegra" -- most impressive!

to jaedrum & MVanDoren1, THANK YOU for sharing your views as well. Blessings.

Nan

Less is more!!!!!!
Keeping it simple can be more effective than blinding 32nd note fills around 7 toms!
Also, it's important that the fill fits the style and groove of the music, look to the phrasing of the song and the other instruments in the band for ideas.

The way I would approach it is to try to build up a library of types or styles of fills.  From simple snare and kick playing off each other to blinding speed over 10 toms.

Once you have a vocabulary of fills to choose from it will become easier to determine what type of fill the song seems to call for.

In the very beginning stages you will need to stress the mechanics, just getting used to what it feels like to actually play the thing and build up some muscles and muscle memory.  Then you can concentrate on the "feel" aspect.  IMO you need both, mechanics and feel.

A teacher can be a great resource or as others suggested, listen to music and try to copy what you hear.  Even if you can't play exactly what you hear just trying will make you improve.

Once you've learned a few "styles" of fills the variations within are endless.

Luv to hear that. Thanks for sharing too.